1969/70 Prototype Mustang
- Thread starter ssmustang
- Start date
Thanks again guys but I can't take any credit for memory at all. The wife and I had a 'discussion' on what day it was yesterday and had to check the tv and phone to figure it out. My only secret to this story is write it down. I have been trying to put all this information together pretty much from the beginning but since doing the restoration I have devoted much more time to it. Must say it wasn't much of a push to post it as I was looking for some feedback on whether I was just spinning my wheels with something no one but me would be interested in, so thanks for the encouraging words!
rmk57: No, I did not run the Canadian heads as by the time I was running in SS they were well known to NHRA. I can't remember for sure but you took a 60 or 80 HP hit (NHRA's way of leveling the playing field) which took you up a class or 2 and negated any advantage to running them. I knew of the development story (from Tony as he was there) since SEMA but promised not to publish it until someone else at least started the ball rolling. Again, so many stories that those involved still will not talk about. Now finally Bruce Sizemore has taken the well deserved credit and spilled the beans.
https://www.428cobrajet.org/straight-scoop-canadian-heads
rmk57: No, I did not run the Canadian heads as by the time I was running in SS they were well known to NHRA. I can't remember for sure but you took a 60 or 80 HP hit (NHRA's way of leveling the playing field) which took you up a class or 2 and negated any advantage to running them. I knew of the development story (from Tony as he was there) since SEMA but promised not to publish it until someone else at least started the ball rolling. Again, so many stories that those involved still will not talk about. Now finally Bruce Sizemore has taken the well deserved credit and spilled the beans.
https://www.428cobrajet.org/straight-scoop-canadian-heads
Carrying on, Byron and Wes were working on stripping the paint and making it a 1970 again. Bruce was of course going to reproduce the graphics from pictures Tony supplied and whatever I could find on the web, Lyle Barwick was brought in to document with pictures and video the whole process and through his talent and efforts I have a gazzillion megabits of data. Dave Smith of Sign Smith would handle the gold leaf and decals as required, pretty much a 'dream team' for whom I am eternally grateful to!! My job was to source as many NOS decals that appeared on the car as I could. I found out very soon that most of the decals were what was called 'salesman samples' which were handed out for sponsorship and were usually larger than the same consumer type easy to find decals.
When I back halved the car in 1977 it had 5 or 6 different paint jobs on it and the body lines were rounded not sharp so I chemically stripped the car to start with bare metal as I wanted a new 'racier' paint job rather than the very stock looking Candy Apple Red that was on the car from Larry. While stripping I was wondering what all the colors on the hood were as I had never seen any Stark Hickey pictures of the Mustang at that point.
At the time I don't remember ever looking for fender stampings of the factory vin. I noted before that it had a 1969 door vin that kind of resembled the 70 windshield vin but after stripping the car and finding out it was just a piece of aluminum with simple label maker numbers and heavily painted to 'hide' it I called Tony again. He explained that NHRA at that time was getting strict with OEM tags and the tech guys knew what the numbers meant. If the car came with an auto and you were trying to run a stick, no, or if it came with a six and you were trying to run a V8, again NHRA wasn't going to allow it.
While Byron and Wes were doing their thing, he emailed me with a 'find'. Neither Tony or I knew these numbers so off I go into more research...
will continue.
When I back halved the car in 1977 it had 5 or 6 different paint jobs on it and the body lines were rounded not sharp so I chemically stripped the car to start with bare metal as I wanted a new 'racier' paint job rather than the very stock looking Candy Apple Red that was on the car from Larry. While stripping I was wondering what all the colors on the hood were as I had never seen any Stark Hickey pictures of the Mustang at that point.
At the time I don't remember ever looking for fender stampings of the factory vin. I noted before that it had a 1969 door vin that kind of resembled the 70 windshield vin but after stripping the car and finding out it was just a piece of aluminum with simple label maker numbers and heavily painted to 'hide' it I called Tony again. He explained that NHRA at that time was getting strict with OEM tags and the tech guys knew what the numbers meant. If the car came with an auto and you were trying to run a stick, no, or if it came with a six and you were trying to run a V8, again NHRA wasn't going to allow it.
While Byron and Wes were doing their thing, he emailed me with a 'find'. Neither Tony or I knew these numbers so off I go into more research...
will continue.
Please keep them coming.
Some of the Ford guys on here will know what a Marti report is and if your old enough even an Eminger invoice. Pretty cool old story, here is a link:
Back in the day, I ordered the Eminger invoices for my Boss and sent her both numbers I had at that time for the race car. Neither vin worked for the race car and she knew enough that the X0 was a prototype number and she only had production vehicle stuff. Another dead end, but now with the new number Byron found I contacted Marti Works. I was able to get the report but had to jump a few hoops for the invoice as usually he requires a title to sell those, but I was ultimately able to convince him I actually owned the car. These documents were HUGE as they totally tied together all the information I had to that date. The Deluxe Marti report showed the Mustang was ordered as an R code (428 CJ ram air) 'test' vehicle by Ford Motor Company Product Engineering Group on September 9th, 1968. I noted previously that the Boss program was given the go ahead from Ford in September 1968, that information comes from Donald Farrs 1983 Boss 302 book that is considered the 'Bible' on the development of the Boss program. He interview those who actually did it and executives approving who everything. It is long out of print, badly earmarked copies sell for 100's of dollars, but I have a copy digitally saved. From that book it is known the development prototypes started as R codes because of the already beefed up shock towers. As the purpose to the Boss 302 was for Trans Am racing this was badly needed.
The few lines on the previous page talked of Kar Kraft doing the first prototype with a regular 69 Fastback in August of 1968. Here is anothe rpage where Matt Donner talks about some of the other prototypes used.
Much as that page really tied what I knew about the Mustang together, but it was also the page the 'sceptics' always quote when any 'so called' prototypes show up. They were all crushed! And that was true as Ford saw them as liabilities, maybe not built to conform to all the safety standard, etc. This is where my 'insider' information became of some use. Some may know the name Bruce Sizemore of 'Preparation H' H/MP Maverick fame and also from the Canadian head story. He took a Cleveland head, cut it into pieces, furnace brazed it together and put it on a Ford 300 six. Needless to say it was a fast car. He liked Tony, and had something to do with him getting the 1970 from Ford. Tony has seen a story that Hubert Platt (one of Fords golden boys and a good racer) was told by Bruce to 'find Tony a good car'. It is well known that Hubert had unfettered access to the X garage, he sold Rusty Gillis (another big name very successful Ford guy) another Boss prototype body he saved from the crusher.
Will continue later,
Back in the day, I ordered the Eminger invoices for my Boss and sent her both numbers I had at that time for the race car. Neither vin worked for the race car and she knew enough that the X0 was a prototype number and she only had production vehicle stuff. Another dead end, but now with the new number Byron found I contacted Marti Works. I was able to get the report but had to jump a few hoops for the invoice as usually he requires a title to sell those, but I was ultimately able to convince him I actually owned the car. These documents were HUGE as they totally tied together all the information I had to that date. The Deluxe Marti report showed the Mustang was ordered as an R code (428 CJ ram air) 'test' vehicle by Ford Motor Company Product Engineering Group on September 9th, 1968. I noted previously that the Boss program was given the go ahead from Ford in September 1968, that information comes from Donald Farrs 1983 Boss 302 book that is considered the 'Bible' on the development of the Boss program. He interview those who actually did it and executives approving who everything. It is long out of print, badly earmarked copies sell for 100's of dollars, but I have a copy digitally saved. From that book it is known the development prototypes started as R codes because of the already beefed up shock towers. As the purpose to the Boss 302 was for Trans Am racing this was badly needed.
The few lines on the previous page talked of Kar Kraft doing the first prototype with a regular 69 Fastback in August of 1968. Here is anothe rpage where Matt Donner talks about some of the other prototypes used.
Much as that page really tied what I knew about the Mustang together, but it was also the page the 'sceptics' always quote when any 'so called' prototypes show up. They were all crushed! And that was true as Ford saw them as liabilities, maybe not built to conform to all the safety standard, etc. This is where my 'insider' information became of some use. Some may know the name Bruce Sizemore of 'Preparation H' H/MP Maverick fame and also from the Canadian head story. He took a Cleveland head, cut it into pieces, furnace brazed it together and put it on a Ford 300 six. Needless to say it was a fast car. He liked Tony, and had something to do with him getting the 1970 from Ford. Tony has seen a story that Hubert Platt (one of Fords golden boys and a good racer) was told by Bruce to 'find Tony a good car'. It is well known that Hubert had unfettered access to the X garage, he sold Rusty Gillis (another big name very successful Ford guy) another Boss prototype body he saved from the crusher.
Will continue later,
rmk57
Well-Known Member
Some of the early Boss 302's and all the 1969 Boss 429's used a special KKX spindle. They have a unique hub and brake rotor. To find a pair today for purchase is extremely expensive (5-6k US). 1970 Ford beefed up the spindle and also made it more mainstream for brake parts.
Good story you have going here!
Good story you have going here!
Yes that is correct, when Tony got the car, which was always going to be a racecar, the disc brakes that drag more than drums that can be 'backed off' to ensure no rolling drag had to go. He soon found out about the special spindles which he was able to talk with the Ford engineers to adapt them to the drum brakes and get the required parts. The second page I attached above talks about why they had to develop the better spindle to take the additional loads.
Not everyone is a history buff, I don't know that I would be so captivated by the story if I didnt know Bob and the car.
Plus it's a Ford so high on my list!
The detail and effort put into thread is amazing!
"Can I have sommore?"
Fred
I can do that Fred. Trying to hit the high points of the story here, but have ALOT more information and related stories collected. I have been working on putting it together into some kind of cohesive form but as a retired Ironworker not a linguist it has been troublesome for me but I am still trying!
Byron was moving ahead with the restoration and armed with this new vin information I was on a quest for information wherever I could find it. Tony had supplied some pictures but very few were in color and of those every one looked like a different color! I was able to find more on the web but same problem, all looked different. Tony told us the story that the design work for the graphics and paint came out of Ford own design studio, they did 2 or 3 different renderings from which Tony was able to pick what he wanted. Most of the factory cars were either blue or white or combinations of the two but as Tony still wanted to still appear more as a privateer rather than another factory car, so he picked the Burgundy scheme. He said the Boss graphics were purposeful as Ford was using them everywhere they could to promote the new Boss.
It was getting very late in the process and we desperately needed to pick the color when in a conversation I had with Tony he said 'you know I think it was a stock Ford color and there was a pearl coat over it'! Now it all made perfect sense, the pearl overlay would change the color with the picture angle and sunlight and we figured out quite quickly the color was Royal Maroon. Armed with this information Byron started spraying samples which we were sending to Tony to finalize the pearls. Here Bruce helped a lot as he knew what pearls were available in 1970 and we were trying to be as correct as possible. It all came together in time for the paint.
Here is a look at the pearl, sure changes the color in certain lighting conditions. Looked great under the SEMA lights and now at the museum.
Will carry on later...
Byron was moving ahead with the restoration and armed with this new vin information I was on a quest for information wherever I could find it. Tony had supplied some pictures but very few were in color and of those every one looked like a different color! I was able to find more on the web but same problem, all looked different. Tony told us the story that the design work for the graphics and paint came out of Ford own design studio, they did 2 or 3 different renderings from which Tony was able to pick what he wanted. Most of the factory cars were either blue or white or combinations of the two but as Tony still wanted to still appear more as a privateer rather than another factory car, so he picked the Burgundy scheme. He said the Boss graphics were purposeful as Ford was using them everywhere they could to promote the new Boss.
It was getting very late in the process and we desperately needed to pick the color when in a conversation I had with Tony he said 'you know I think it was a stock Ford color and there was a pearl coat over it'! Now it all made perfect sense, the pearl overlay would change the color with the picture angle and sunlight and we figured out quite quickly the color was Royal Maroon. Armed with this information Byron started spraying samples which we were sending to Tony to finalize the pearls. Here Bruce helped a lot as he knew what pearls were available in 1970 and we were trying to be as correct as possible. It all came together in time for the paint.
Here is a look at the pearl, sure changes the color in certain lighting conditions. Looked great under the SEMA lights and now at the museum.
Will carry on later...
Great question! You guys are really going over this stuff. You are correct, non ram airs were Q codes, and I don't know why most of the prototypes were built out of R codes? I say most because the one Hubert sold to Rusty Gillis is a Q code and there may have been others? Another interesting fact, the first couple of Mustangs that went to Kar Kraft to be built into Trans-Am cars were R codes, after that they used M codes, another mystery?
OK, the answer to your inquiry. I am going to attach the first couple pages from the 1971 Popular Hot Rodding article in which Tony explains why he is running a flat hood with the heavy valve motor. One thing to remember, this is 1971 and the classes changed in later years as NHRA was always tweaking the 'factored' HP. On the second page it states 'In 1970 the high compression valves weren't even offered', obviously a typo which should have said high compression piston aka the SCJ motor. That was the rule when Tony wanted to run a SCJ and was forced to change the Mustang back to a 1969. Ford had simply not released production figures for the 1970 SCJ motors to NHRA yet. Ford of course built 70 SCJ's but at that time as far as NHRA was concerned the SCJ's were legal only in 69's.
More tomorrow,
OK, the answer to your inquiry. I am going to attach the first couple pages from the 1971 Popular Hot Rodding article in which Tony explains why he is running a flat hood with the heavy valve motor. One thing to remember, this is 1971 and the classes changed in later years as NHRA was always tweaking the 'factored' HP. On the second page it states 'In 1970 the high compression valves weren't even offered', obviously a typo which should have said high compression piston aka the SCJ motor. That was the rule when Tony wanted to run a SCJ and was forced to change the Mustang back to a 1969. Ford had simply not released production figures for the 1970 SCJ motors to NHRA yet. Ford of course built 70 SCJ's but at that time as far as NHRA was concerned the SCJ's were legal only in 69's.
More tomorrow,
Sorry for this getting long. Getting closer to the end now.
The restoration was progressing well at this point (winter 2012/spring 13), Byron had color on the car and I was doing fairly well with the NOS decals needed. The new vin had helped a bunch on better understanding what the Mustang did at Ford. I have to back up to the mid 70's for a bit as I told you all when I bought Larrys 69 body, I bought Bruces Holbrook motor. Bruce set up a bit of a 'mail order' speed shop for us as most of the parts me and others were looking for no one in S'toon stocked. We would order stuff, was all sent to Bacon Signs in Minot and we made frequent trips to pick it up. Needless to say the guys at Portal knew us well. During one of the trips Larry said why don't you buy my old CJ motor (the one he got in the car from Tony). I didn't need it but he gave me a good deal so brought it back, disassembled it and oiled/greased everything down. Fast forward now to when I was thinking about streeting the car, I put the motor back together and back into the Mustang. When I left Canada, the car went into the sea can in the quonset. Every year I would come back, spin the motor over, re oil or fog the cylinders and back off the valves. Now we are getting close to being done and time to fire it up. Pulled the plugs and spun it over to get as much oil out of the cylinders we could, changed the oil (was very high after the years of oiling it down) and gave it a try. Byron posted a video on you tube that seems to be gone now but it fired right up, a little smokey until it cleaned out the cylinders but after sitting 38 years it was alive again! Video won't post here but this a still shot from it.
Was very happy at this point that I finally did something with the Mustang but where do we go from here? My purpose was to get it back to what it started as, document what it was and get it somewhere that anyone interested could see it. Byron offered some options around S'toon but I was thinking more? Not sure when the SEMA offer came up but Byron had shown there before and was headed down with the Snake Bit charity truck anyway, so that became the plan. SEMA in the Taylor wire booth. I started looking around the area for a museum or display venue that would fit. Of course, my 'holy grail' was the NHRA museum (I wanted to stay on the west coast so I could justify some trips to see it). I didn't know anyone there but crafted an email to the curator with some information on the car and my desire to loan it for display. I got an email back that was brief and to the point. It said something like 'hopefully we can find a spot to display your fine Mustang soon'. Sounded good but nothing firm or binding. On to SEMA. We rented a big house, Tony and Bill came and pretty much everyone involved with the car. I continued to look around for something, had some offers from guys who saw the car, one was a rolling car show, they would tour different city with some fixed cars and add more locally. Didn't like the idea of it moving around so much even though he assured me it would be fully insured. That chapter ended with the Mustang going back into storage in Vegas for the time being and hoping NHRA would come through.
The first to find us was Elana Scheer who at the time was writing for Hot Rod magazine, she did an online article. Autoweek also did one.
www.motortrend.com
We were getting a little flack with our claims of prototype status but for sure with Tony and Bill there, not much of the history couldn't be explained. Tony and I went to a lounge somewhere in the venue where we were trying to figure out how to contact Donald Farr. As I said before, he was the author of the 'bible' on Boss development and we thought he would be a good place to start the clarification? On returning to the car, who should be standing there waiting for us to return, Donald Farr himself!
Later..
The restoration was progressing well at this point (winter 2012/spring 13), Byron had color on the car and I was doing fairly well with the NOS decals needed. The new vin had helped a bunch on better understanding what the Mustang did at Ford. I have to back up to the mid 70's for a bit as I told you all when I bought Larrys 69 body, I bought Bruces Holbrook motor. Bruce set up a bit of a 'mail order' speed shop for us as most of the parts me and others were looking for no one in S'toon stocked. We would order stuff, was all sent to Bacon Signs in Minot and we made frequent trips to pick it up. Needless to say the guys at Portal knew us well. During one of the trips Larry said why don't you buy my old CJ motor (the one he got in the car from Tony). I didn't need it but he gave me a good deal so brought it back, disassembled it and oiled/greased everything down. Fast forward now to when I was thinking about streeting the car, I put the motor back together and back into the Mustang. When I left Canada, the car went into the sea can in the quonset. Every year I would come back, spin the motor over, re oil or fog the cylinders and back off the valves. Now we are getting close to being done and time to fire it up. Pulled the plugs and spun it over to get as much oil out of the cylinders we could, changed the oil (was very high after the years of oiling it down) and gave it a try. Byron posted a video on you tube that seems to be gone now but it fired right up, a little smokey until it cleaned out the cylinders but after sitting 38 years it was alive again! Video won't post here but this a still shot from it.
Was very happy at this point that I finally did something with the Mustang but where do we go from here? My purpose was to get it back to what it started as, document what it was and get it somewhere that anyone interested could see it. Byron offered some options around S'toon but I was thinking more? Not sure when the SEMA offer came up but Byron had shown there before and was headed down with the Snake Bit charity truck anyway, so that became the plan. SEMA in the Taylor wire booth. I started looking around the area for a museum or display venue that would fit. Of course, my 'holy grail' was the NHRA museum (I wanted to stay on the west coast so I could justify some trips to see it). I didn't know anyone there but crafted an email to the curator with some information on the car and my desire to loan it for display. I got an email back that was brief and to the point. It said something like 'hopefully we can find a spot to display your fine Mustang soon'. Sounded good but nothing firm or binding. On to SEMA. We rented a big house, Tony and Bill came and pretty much everyone involved with the car. I continued to look around for something, had some offers from guys who saw the car, one was a rolling car show, they would tour different city with some fixed cars and add more locally. Didn't like the idea of it moving around so much even though he assured me it would be fully insured. That chapter ended with the Mustang going back into storage in Vegas for the time being and hoping NHRA would come through.
The first to find us was Elana Scheer who at the time was writing for Hot Rod magazine, she did an online article. Autoweek also did one.
Ford-Sponsored Boss 302 Super Stock Mustang at SEMA - Hot Rod Blog
Stark-Hickey campaigned this Super Stock Boss 302 Mustang, which made a showing at SEMA 2013.
We were getting a little flack with our claims of prototype status but for sure with Tony and Bill there, not much of the history couldn't be explained. Tony and I went to a lounge somewhere in the venue where we were trying to figure out how to contact Donald Farr. As I said before, he was the author of the 'bible' on Boss development and we thought he would be a good place to start the clarification? On returning to the car, who should be standing there waiting for us to return, Donald Farr himself!
Later..
rmk57
Well-Known Member
When you first mentioned a Mustang at the NHRA museum in the other thread I thought holy smokes he used to own "Ohio" Georges Malco gasser!
Last time I was at the museum was 10-12 years ago, maybe longer?
I see in the NHRA guide they give the 1970 CJ Mustang non-ram air 345 factored hp with oem heads and 350 with aftermarket heads in super stock. I've always loved the stock/super stock classes from back in the day. Used to go to Seattle to the national race and cheer on Jim Waldo's Fairlane or his son Eric in the CJ Mustang in stock. Today I guess there is a few still running FE's with Ray Paquet's T-bolt the pinnacle of a super stock Ford.
Locally Mike Nottingham I heard is bumping up a couple classes with his 427 67 Fairlane (SS/C or D?) and Howie Stevens apparently has a 64 Fairlane T-bolt in the works.
Last time I was at the museum was 10-12 years ago, maybe longer?
I see in the NHRA guide they give the 1970 CJ Mustang non-ram air 345 factored hp with oem heads and 350 with aftermarket heads in super stock. I've always loved the stock/super stock classes from back in the day. Used to go to Seattle to the national race and cheer on Jim Waldo's Fairlane or his son Eric in the CJ Mustang in stock. Today I guess there is a few still running FE's with Ray Paquet's T-bolt the pinnacle of a super stock Ford.
Locally Mike Nottingham I heard is bumping up a couple classes with his 427 67 Fairlane (SS/C or D?) and Howie Stevens apparently has a 64 Fairlane T-bolt in the works.
rmk57: I still love stock/super stock stuff as well but can't imagine what it would cost to keep one up and running these days. The Waldo's were always a class act and I thought I saw one of theirs for sale not long ago for not crazy money? I am glad some local guys are still out there running! It was the most fun I ever had racing but of course the times have changed a bunch since then. I also watch Ray, he and the car are really something. Tony knows him and I get reports once and awhile on what he is up to. Amazing 9200+ with an FE. Here is the best interview I have ever seen with him, worth the look. My question to Tony was, why no clutch for the first two gears and then clutch from 3rd to 4th?
Just another off topic note, when I was at Holbrooks in 1977 he offered me one of the original 50 Thunderbolts. It was over at Tom Smiths (Wolverine Chassis) and we drove over to look at it, 10K fresh, turnkey no paint. One of the things that stopped me was SS/C was a really tough class and not that they aren't attractive, but it looked like an old car compared to the Mustang. Not sure if I did the right thing????
Just another off topic note, when I was at Holbrooks in 1977 he offered me one of the original 50 Thunderbolts. It was over at Tom Smiths (Wolverine Chassis) and we drove over to look at it, 10K fresh, turnkey no paint. One of the things that stopped me was SS/C was a really tough class and not that they aren't attractive, but it looked like an old car compared to the Mustang. Not sure if I did the right thing????